


Sometimes *EDITED VERSION*

by blobfish_miffy



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Azula (mentioned) - Freeform, Developing Friendships, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Ozai (Avatar) is an Asshole, Protective Sokka (Avatar), Zuko is an Awkward Turtleduck, Zuko is my child, basically the gaang adopting zuko, zutara if you squint really well
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-21
Updated: 2018-09-21
Packaged: 2019-07-15 03:10:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16054235
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blobfish_miffy/pseuds/blobfish_miffy
Summary: ****This is an edited version of the "Sometimes" posted by me on the 27th of December in 2017. That version is bad, but I'll keep it online because I'm sentimental****In which Zuko opens up and is filled with love, because he deserves it goddammit.Includes a few f-bombs.





	Sometimes *EDITED VERSION*

**Author's Note:**

> PLEASE READ  
> This is an edited version of the "Sometimes" posted by me on the 27th of December in 2017. That version is bad, but I'll keep it online because I'm sentimental and also want to see my progress. Thank you!

He knew it was inevitable.

It was bound to happen, he knew. He’d always noticed. Pure curiosity dripping from their faces, mild fascination reflected in their large irises; it bugged him to no end when they wouldn’t dare to open their mouths. He could see the questions lying on the tip of their tongues. Every single time he would catch a glimpse of their questioning faces, their expression turned neutral as soon as he so much turned his head. It was infuriating, really. He wanted to yell, scream at them to just ask, _to just get it fucking over with_ – but they never did. He never really wanted to tell, never did see it as part of the process of redeeming himself, but he knew they wanted to know. They just never dared to ask.

Until then.

The sky was an inky-black, thousands of tiny stars twinkling across the velvet of the universe, a small moon resembling a button straight in the center. The night was silent, save the slight crackle of burning embers of the dying fire.

They – all of them – where lying on the hard stone, staring at the vast night sky. Perhaps some of them were trying to get some rest – Katara, ever the motherly figure, had stocked them up with blankets and pillows from within the house, as nights could get cold on the island, but Zuko knew that most of them were thinking.

Then it happened.

“Zuko?” Katara’s gentle voice was soft, barely louder than the background noise of the firepit. “May I ask how you got that scar?”

His sharp intake of breath – shock, mainly – was enough for her to cringe and start apologizing. She rattled off some shit along the lines of him needing to forget about it if it makes him uncomfortable, and that she’s sorry and never intended to hurt him in any way(which was completely bull, by the way). He was almost annoyed by how quickly she backtracked, would’ve grunted in frustration if he hadn’t detected the hint of shame in her voice.

“It’s okay, Katara,” he said, and he hoped his voice didn’t sound as harsh as it felt to him. “I expected you to get curious. It’s alright.”

It was as if the entire world held their breath, and with it his chest constricted making it so that he couldn’t really breathe. He tried his best to calm himself down, tried breathing in patterns, but it didn’t make him forget their stares. Even while keeping his eyes fixed stubbornly on the ridiculous amount of stars, he felt their eyes burning his skin. He felt their gazes trail up to the mutilated side of his face. He felt their anticipation.

So he sighed through his nose, and sat up slowly.

Zuko wasn’t able to completely control his fire when he threw a piece of wood from the pile next to the fire pit on the smoldering embers. The quick beating of his heart, no doubt overheard by the ever-attentive Toph, made it so that the flames refused to cooperate; sparks were flying from his fingers as tried to light the dry fibers of some spare grass as carefully as possible. Had anyone paid good attention, they would’ve noticed the slight tremor of his hand.

“It’s rather sad,” he managed to utter as soon as he lit the campfire back up again. He draped the blanket around his legs to protect them from the heat, and focused on some loose threads. “Not sure if you’d want to hear that right now.”

“We’re used to pathetically tragic backstories, Sparky.” Toph harshly kicked his shin, and grinned widely at his hiss of pain. “Just get on with it already.”

He deeply inhaled in a futile attempt to calm his nerves. It didn’t work.

“When I was a child,” he started off, attempting to keep his voice as neutral as possible, “my father was this picture of perfection to me.”

Sokka’s snort was cut off by a harsh cough.

“Watching him bend fire was like watching art,” Zuko recalled, ignoring his idiot friend, closing his eyes as memories danced across his vision. “It was beautiful. Explosive, frightening, and dangerous, but beautiful. I’d heard my grandfather disapprove of my father’s style more often than not, but I still though that my father was the best. He was cruel to me,” he continued, “enjoyed making me suffer. It was as if he felt satisfaction in the despair of his child, but at the time I didn’t realize this.

“When Azula was seven months, she said her first words. When she was thirteen months, she took her first steps. When she was fifteen months, she set fire to the curtains in her bedroom. I’d started talking whole sentences at eight months, I started running – I never started walking – at fourteen. And when I was sixteen months, I burned down my crib by accident.”

He clenched his fists.

“Me doing more at an older age wasn’t enough for my father. Azula was always the best. She was the prodigy, and I was the failure. I can’t say I was never jealous, and I must admit that his praising of her and his dismissal of me was the only thing that motivated me to continue firebending. I hated bending. It was too harsh and painful, and it hurt if you made a small mistake and my fingers were constantly blistered because of the heat. One time, when I didn’t get a kata in one go, my father hit me so hard I saw stars. Then he made me do it again, and I did it. It must’ve helped in some way, the fear, but it wasn’t a preferable way of teaching.

My teachers always said I was a bright student. For my father, I just wasn’t bright enough, because Azula was brighter. When she was eleven, she almost mastered all kata’s. I still had ten to go. Me preferring fighting without bending was also something my father despised. You wouldn’t believe how happy I was when my uncle managed to convince my father to send me to train sword fighting under master Piandao. It was a complete escape.”

“Why didn’t your mother protect you?” Katara’s voice sounded small, and his heart clenched. “Isn’t that what mothers are supposed to do?”

“She tried.” He said calmly. “But then she disappeared, and my father became Firelord, and things became even worse.”

“How?” Sokka asks. The confusion is clear in his voice. “Didn’t he get more busy then?”

“As the oldest child, I became the crown prince, and the pressure was enlarged.” He told them. “My bending didn’t improve quickly, and Azula tormented me about it day and night. But I still tried.

My uncle, being known as the Dragon of the West, was still a respected member of the royal family and the army of the Fire Nation. I asked if I could come to one of the war meetings. I wanted to know what it was like, if I was going to become an Admiral in a couple of years because of my status. My uncle allowed me to go.” He bit his lip, harshly, and tasted blood. “That was a mistake.”

Aang made a small nose of anticipation.

“One of the generals had a cruel plan.” Zuko continued, voice softer now. “He was prepared to sacrifice an entire division of new recruits, a division of hundreds of sixteen year old boys, to a couple of Earth Kingdom soldiers. They would’ve been nothing more than a distraction, all so that his troops could pass without a fucking hair out of place. I, of course, didn’t agree.” He inhaled deeply once again, squeezing his eyes shut. “I made the stupid mistake of speaking out in anger, and disagreeing with the plan vocally. I insulted the old general. That angered my father terribly.

He was of opinion that, as I had insulted the general, I had to fight an Agni-Kai to regain my honor. I observed that the general was old and frail, and accepted. I would’ve easily beaten him. But I’d misunderstood. As the general was under my father’s command, it wasn’t the general I’d insulted. It was my father. He wanted me to duel him.” His voice cracked and he stopped, chewing on the side of his cheek, eyes directed at the fire. The scarred skin around his eye burned again, and hurt so bad that he bit his lip until the previous cut split open and blood flooded his tastebuds.

A small hand wrapped around his elbow and squeezed tightly. He almost flinched, but Toph’s harsh comfort was enough for him to continue.

“I refused to fight him.” He chokes out. “I couldn’t fight him – I still respected him too much. I’d trained my entire life to prove my worth to him, but not in that way.” He blinks harshly. “My father saw my refusal as cowardice. And in his opinion, cowardice shouldn’t go without punishment.”

“No,” he heared someone whisper – probably Suki, maybe Aang, but he didn’t really care at that moment.

“He burned half of my face off and banished me. When I woke up from pain, I was on a ship, and my uncle was in the room with fresh bandages. When I first saw the wound, I had to vomit.” He dug his fingers in his thighs. “There was a letter on my desk. An official letter, written and signed by my father himself. I was to only return if I’d bring the avatar back and got them locked up in a fire nation prison. It was the perfect way to be rid of me forever, actually, until you actually floated back up from the bottom of the South Pole.

So,” he sighed, finally raising his gaze to glance at the others, who all looked either a bit sick or a bit teary-eyed. Aang was stark white, Sokka looked like he’d been bawling his eyes out, and Suki was still wiping her eyes. Katara was staring at him with a gaze that made him feel weird inside, and Toph was still squeezing his elbow tightly. “That’s my story. It’s what you wanted to know, wasn’t it?”

“Well,” Sokka broke the silence in a choked up voice. “You sure as fuck delivered, buddy. I don’t think I’m ever going to feel happy again.”

“That was sadder than burning rice,” Katara added, as if she was trying to had some much-needed humor to the situation. He managed to send her a half-smile, and her face softened considerably.

“That wasn’t pathetic at all. Just very, very sad.” Toph spoke, finally. He turned his head to look at her and her milky eyes were focussed on his face, as if she was observing him. But that was bullshit, because she can’t even see. “You’re one tough cookie, Sparky.”

“He’s nuts,” he heard Aang mutter, despair clear in his voice. “He’s completely nuts.”

“It’s a family thing.” He wanted to say, but his voice had bailed out on him and he decided it might’ve been a bad joke anyway.

“I’ll kill him for you,” Sokka promised, voice sincere.

“I’ll help.” Suki added. “I’m gonna stick my fan so far up his ass-”

“Does it still hurt?” Katara interrupted Suki, the blush visible on her tan cheeks, and she stared at him as if he was a fragile little turtle-duckling and she his mother. But the question didn’t annoy him, and his heart hurt, because she cared. They all care. And he wished he could’ve said “no, of course it doesn’t hurt” but he didn’t, because he would’ve lied. Scars keep hurting, he knew, whether physically or mentally. They keep hurting until you forget about them briefly, but then they hurt again, and again, and again –

So instead of saying that, he smiled carefully, and answered “Sometimes”.

And somehow, they managed to jump on top of him, all of them at once.

Aang was slung across his back, like some sort of monkey; Katara’d buried her face in his neck; Toph was squeezed against his chest by Sokka, who had slung his arms around his sister and his girlfriend, who was clutching his arm a little painfully.

“Okay, okay, I’m fine, dude – seriously. Get off me now, please.”

They all sat back – Katara was still touching his hand – and he felt flustered and happy. The feeling spread through his body, and he relaxed for the first time in months.

“We all love you, Sparky,” Toph extended her leg slightly and pushed against his knee with her big toe in an affectionate manner. “We’re you’re family, now. No more absent mothers, or abusive dads, or crazy sisters.” She paused. “You know what? Let’s just say no more absent mothers, because Katara is like always here, and though you’re the dad, you’re always angry, and-”

“What Toph means,” Aang interrupted, sheepishly grinning. “We love you to bits, Zuko. You’re kind of like this annoying pet that we didn’t want at first, but stuck around anyways, and we couldn’t do without now.”

“I feel flattered,” Zuko managed to choke out, not feeling at all insulted by being compared to a pet. “I wouldn’t want it any other way.”

Everyone crawled back to their pillows and blankets and Zuko leaned back on the hard stones, pulling the itchy blanket over his body and laying his head back on the pillow. He listened how everybody settled down, relaxing at the soft murmurs of ‘this is my pillow, fuck off’ and ‘shut up’. A silence fell over the group once more, and as everyone’s breathing slowed he noticed a weird feeling at settled in the pit of his stomach. He felt content, as if telling the past to his… his friends had dropped some weight from his shoulders.

Sokka was the one to break the silence again.

“You know what, Suck-o, I mean it. With the kind of fuck up of a dad you’ve had, you fucking deserve the not-as-much-of-a-jerk-you-could’ve-been-award.”

“The _what?”_


End file.
